John Terry out of England captaincy

John Terry has been stripped of the England captaincy, the Football Association has confirmed.

The 31-year-old Chelsea centre-back was informed of the decision by FA chairman David Bernstein in a phone call at 1000 GMT.

He is due to stand trial in July over racial abuse allegations after an incident with QPR's Anton Ferdinand.

Terry, who lost the captaincy once previously, has entered a plea of not guilty to the charge.

In a statement, the FA said Terry would not "captain the England team until the allegations against him are resolved".

It continued: "The FA board expected the trial to be concluded prior to the European Championship.

"Further to Wednesday's confirmation that the trial will not take place until after the tournament, the board has discussed the matter in detail and has collectively decided it is in the interests of all parties that John has the responsibilities of captaincy removed at this time.

"This decision has been taken due to the higher profile nature of the England captaincy, on and off the pitch, and the additional demands and requirements expected of the captain leading into and during a tournament."

Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas said Terry's strong will would help him during this period.

"He is disappointed, but John is a person of good mental strength and great personal convictions," said the Blues manager.

"So he has to move on, he has to move on. He went past this period before when he was stripped before of the [England] captaincy.

"He came back to a level still of great individual performances.

"So, in that sense, on the sense of pure player-manager relationship and team, his performances haven't dropped a level."

Terry will miss Sunday's game against Manchester United because of the knee injury which kept him out of Tuesday's match at Swansea.